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James Mont Twisted Oak Dark Walnut Finish Hollywood Regency Standing Lamp

Name: James Mont Twisted Oak Dark Walnut Finish Hollywood Regency Standing Lamp
Brand: James Mont
Price: 3900 USD
Availability: InStock

About the Item

James Mont standing lamp, dark walnut lacquered finish, midcentury Hollywood Regency design. Mont was born Demetrios Pecintoglu in Istanbul (then Constantinople, capital of the Ottoman Empire) in 1904. The early life of the man who became Mont is shrouded in mystery. It is believed, however, that he came from a family of artists and immigrated to the United States in the 1920s by way of Western Europe. While pushing his own lamp designs while working at a Brooklyn electrical retailer, Mont was noticed by a Mafioso named Frankie Yale. This opened the door for Mont to become decorator for the mob, so to speak. It also inspired in him a criminal-type pretension which he would attempt to keep up for the remainder of his career. Mont’s designs set him apart as a singular figure of the American midcentury. Straddling the overlapping worlds of Art Deco, Hollywood Regency, and Mid-Century Modern, he conformed to and defied all of them. His work displays a heavy reliance on the chinoiserie style so popular in European design of the previous century. Feeling himself to be representative of “the Orient,” Mont was always trying to incorporate its aura into his furniture. Today, the painstaking skill in the executions of his lacquers makes his work more desirable than ever. From sandblasting to cerusing to lacquering, Mont was known to be an obsessive perfectionist in his executions. Oftentimes painting over his woods up to fourteen times before applying lacquer to them, Mont would then instruct his workers to rub the varnishes with chalk until they almost came off, allowing the painted colors to come through. Mont’s designs were also notable for their unique use of metal leaf, especially silver. Unlike his Modernist contemporaries, Mont was not driven by any thesis in his designs. They came from an emotional place-to create beautiful furnishings with an aesthetic he felt was natural to him. Mont’s emotional nature would eventually catch up with him, however. After a prison stint for assault and his abandonment by a formerly loyal clientele, Mont found himself indebted and fled to Greece to escape his creditors. He died impoverished in 1978. Mont’s designs found new life in the 1990s, as auction houses and dealers rediscovered their potential. Adventurous interior designers have used his daring, dramatic creations to juxtapose the geometric, linear shapes of the modern style, thus creating exceptional counterbalances. Mont’s luscious colors, monumental scale, and bespoke shape and quality have intrigued these modern designers almost as much as the fiery, dangerous aspects of the life he lived.

Creator:

James Mont (Designer)

Dimensions:

Height: 60 in (152.4 cm)Diameter: 13 in (33.02 cm)

Style:

Hollywood Regency (Of the Period)

Materials and Techniques:

Aluminum,Oak,Walnut,Lacquered,Spun

Place of Origin:

United States

Period:

Early 20th Century

Date of Manufacture:

1940s

Condition:

Rewired: Elegant lacquered finish , very fine condition. Refinished. Wear consistent with age and use.

Seller Location:

Westport, CT

Reference Number:

1stDibs: LU910821525152

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Shop All James Mont

James Mont

James Mont’s life as an unmistakably talented furniture designer and interior decorator could fill the pages of a best-selling novel or be reimagined as a Hollywood feature film. From the 1930s through the 1960s, Tinseltown’s glitterati and Manhattan’s Mafia underworld coveted his sofas, coffee tables and table lamps.

Mont was born Demetrios Pecintoglu in Istanbul, Turkey, in 1904 to a family of artists. He reportedly studied architecture and art in Spain and France, and during the 1920s, Mont immigrated with his family to the United States.

Mont and his family settled in New York, where he found work in a Brooklyn electrical supply shop. There he sold hardware and designed his own lighting fixtures. The latter caught the eye of a gangster named Frankie Yale, who commissioned him to refurnish his house. Mont’s opulent designs drew on Art Deco, Hollywood Regency and were occasionally marked by chinoiserie, then a very popular trend in decorating. He created the kind of low-profile side tables and sofas that are frequently associated with mid-century modernism, and he is credited today with helping popularize the integration of Asian influences in modern American design.

Mont soon attracted New York City’s most infamous crime bosses, including Charles “Lucky” Luciano and Frank Costello. For a range of mobsters, he created fashionable, functional and sophisticated pieces such as collapsible home bars that would fold down and out of view — a particularly convenient feature during Prohibition — and tables and desks with secret drawers, which were also handy to Mont’s shady clientele.

“You bought a bar from him, and he would also deliver booze in a baby carriage,” antiques dealer and furniture retailer Todd Merrill told New York about Mont in 2008.

Mont designed a room for the World’s Fair in 1939 and later befriended Hollywood celebrities such as Bob Hope, who was best man at his wedding, Irving Berlin and Lana Turner. During the 1940s and ‘50s, Mont continued designing furniture, mastering finishing techniques such as lacquering and incorporating a distinctive “leafing” print effect with silver and gold into his pieces.

Mont’s designs enjoyed a resurgence in the 1990s, and his pieces continue to be sought after by collectors.

On 1stDibs, discover a range of vintage James Mont sideboards, tables and storage cabinets.